Google hired Timnit Gebru to be an outspoken critic of unethical AI. Then she was fired for it.

In an internal memo that he later posted online explaining Gebru's departure, Dean told employees that the paper "didn't meet our bar for publication" and "ignored too much relevant research" on recent positive improvements to the technology. Gebru's superiors had insisted that she and the other Google co-authors either retract the paper or remove their names. Employees in Google Research, the department that houses the ethical AI team, say authors who make claims about the benefits of large language models have not received the same scrutiny during the approval process as those who highlight the shortcomings.